32 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



tree is young do not allow it to bear much, if any, fruit. Sixth, 

 keep the ground light by cultivating potatoes or roots in the 

 rows. 



The orchard you looked at on my place has one hundred and 

 fifty trees, set in rows or lines twelve feet distant, and the rows 

 eight feet ; one hundred and thirty-six trees eight feet distant, 

 in rows or lines, and rows twelve feet. 



Someiiville, January 7, 1867. 



Statement of Edwin Wlieeler. 



Gentlemen: — The orchard which your attention is respect- 

 fully called to, contains one and one-half acres of land and three 

 hundred and seventy-eight trees ; eighty-eight are on pear 

 stocks, the balance on quince, and were set as follows : Eighty- 

 four were set in the springs of 1853-54, on sward land — a 

 plan I would not recommend any one to follow — by digging 

 holes about four feet in diameter and one-and-a-half deep, using 

 mud and compost about them. The rows set seventeen feet 

 apart and ten feet apart in the rows ; the trees alternate on pear 

 and quince. These eighty-four trees contained nearly twenty 

 varieties, which was about double that I bargained for — a way 

 I have seen since practised on too many occasions, by those who 

 sell trees to persons who do not know one variety from another, 

 as was my case at that time. Of these eighty-four trees sixteen 

 were Bartletts. ] lost by the hard winter of 1857 nine of these, 

 and the others were more or less injured, which discouraged 

 me for a long time in trying to raise Bartlett pears, and has 

 given that part of the orchard an unpleasant appearance by 

 being filled out with trees of different sizes. 



In the fall of 1863 and spring of 1864, 1 set eighty-four more, 

 and to this part of the orchard I would particularly call your 

 attention, as that which I present for your premium. They 

 were planted the same distance apart as the above lot, on pear 

 and quince stocks, the ground having been cultivated with corn 

 and potatoes the year previous, and manured only for those 

 crops. The holes for the trees I dug as previously stated, set 

 the standards the same depth as they set in the nursery, and the 

 quince stocks about three inches below where they were budded, 

 using no manure or compost at the time of planting, but applied 

 a liberal quantity broadcast before ploughing for roots, with which 



